Family Meal Time
The number of households that do not schedule a family meal together is surprising. As children grow into their adolescent years, it is even more challenging to find time during the week to schedule meal times together. Life just gets busy and we easily yield our time for leisurely meals in favor of other activities.In earlier years, children needed mealtime experiences to develop appropriate eating habits and manners, and to learn about a variety of foods. During adolescence, the need for mealtime doesn't decrease. There is still a need to sit down with one another over food to discuss the events of the day, relax a bit, and enjoy the food before us. In fact, one recent study with adolescents demonstrated that teens who participate in family dinners tend to have more healthy diets than those who don't eat in family meals.
Adolescence is a time to begin developing life skills for the days ahead when youth will be on their own. Take the opportunity to help your teen develop meal planning, food budgeting and preparation skills. These tasks also allow the youth to use his or her own creativity when it comes to meals so that the entire family will benefit. It is sometimes a challenge to turn children loose in the kitchen because as parents we don't look forward to the messes that might be left. For that reason, remember that cleaning up after oneself teaches a lesson in responsibility.
Better yet, if you aren't comfortable turning your teens loose in the kitchen, plan to join them there. The food preparation and clean up time can also be a family time that leads to fun, family conversations. Learning from one another in the kitchen is community building!
Our food values and traditions are based on our family experiences. Make your approaches to food enjoyable and help your teens cherish times in the kitchen and around family meals that they'll never forget. It takes some time and planning but the results will be worth it. There will be stories for the years to come!
Too Much Sugar -- Not Enough Calcium
In today's world, there are several concerns about what is happening to family meal time. We lead very busy lives; there's not enough time. Consequently, many of us, adults, children and youth, don't even make it into the kitchen to prepare foods for a meal. We are at risk of losing many of our cooking skills. If we are not enjoying meals together, we are also likely to be losing significant time spent in family communications. Nutrition professionals are also concerned about what the lack of family meal times means for the nutritional well being of family members.Milk intake is definitely down -- there has been a shift from whole milk to low-fat or nonfat choices but total milk consumption is down (cheese consumption is up). At the same time soft drink consumption is up. Nutritionally, these two trends are of great concern because the decline in milk consumption affects calcium consumption. The upward trend in soft drinks results in increased sugar consumption. A recent study of youth aged 11 - 17 found that additional servings of sugar-sweetened drinks were associated with greater body mass index and a growing frequency of obesity. Another study found that eating family dinners together every day is linked to higher intake of both iron and calcium in youth.
Sources:
Gilman, MW, Rifas-Shiman, SL, Frazier, AL, Rockett, HRH, Camargo Jr., CA, Field, AE, Berkey, CS, Colditz, GA. Family
dinner and diet quality among older children and adolescents. Archives Family Medicine 9:235-240, 2000.
Mackenzie, M. Is the Family Meal Disappearing? Journal of Gastronomy 7(1):36-37, 1993.
USDA. Economic Research Service
Bowman, SA, Lino, M, Gerrior, AS, Basiotis, PP., The Healthy Eating Index 1995-96. US Department of Agriculture,
Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion. CNPP-5. 1998
This edition of the Ups & Downs was contributed by Linda Boeckner, Ph.D., R.D., Extension Nutrition Specialist, University of Nebraska Panhandle Research and Extension Center. Ups & Downs is co-edited by Rosalie Bakken and Stephen T. Russell, Ph.D., 4-H Youth Development Specialist, University of California-Davis.